Film shredder having oscillating guide nozzle for twisting web during feed



JONES ETAL 2,930,535 FILM SHREDDER HAVING OSCILLATING GUIDE NOZZLE FOR TWISTING WEB DURING FEED Filed Dec. 6, 1956 March 29, 1960 FILM SHREDDER HAVING OSCILLATING GUIDE NOZZLE FOR TWISTING WEB DURING FEED Allen P. Jones and William M. Watts, Fredericksburg,

and Joseph A. Zitz, Stafford, Va., assignors to American Viscose Corporation, Philadelphia, Pa., a corporation of Delaware Application December 6, 1956, Serial No. 626,724 2 Claims. (Cl. 241-301) The present invention relates to an apparatus for producing shredded material such as packing material from a supply of flexible sheet material. In particular, the invention relates to an apparatus for producing shredded packing material from cellophane sheets.

There is a terrific demand on the market for shredded packing material for use in packing articles and especially for protectively packing articles of a fragile nature. Many packers prefer to use a cellophane shredded packing material because of the more attractive properties of the film over ordinary paper packing material. These properties mentioned above relate to the transparency of the film, the sheen of the fihn, and, in some cases, the attractive colors when the shredded material is produced from colored cellophane. In producing the shredded cellophane, extremely cumbersome and unsatisfactory slitters and shredders have been used. The sheet material must be slit into narrow continuous lengths and then cut in a transverse direction to produce the shredded material of satisfactory small length.

It is therefore one object of our invention to provide a novel and improved apparatus for producing shredded material from flexible sheet material wherein the longitudinal slitting and transverse cutting of the material is accomplished in a single operation.

Another object of our invention is to provide a novel and improved method for producing shredded material from flexible sheet material.

Other objects and advantages of our invention will become apparent from a study of the following description aid drawing wherein:

Figure l is a top view of our shredding apparatus;

Figure 2 is a side view of our shredding apparatus;

Figure 3 is a fragmentary view which shows one operating feature of our apparatus; and

Figure 4' represents a single strip of the shredded material.

Generally, our invention includes an elongated guide nozzle through which the film or sheet material is drawn in unfolded form. The film or sheet material travels downwardly through the nozzle from which it is received by a pair of cooperating slitting rolls. The nozzle is supported on a rotatable base connected with a drive Patented Mar. 29, 1960 Aifixed to the top plate 5 is a permanent ring-shaped member 9 which, as seen in Figure 2 of the drawing, has a shoulder 11 extending around its inner periphery. Positioned concentrically within the ring-shaped member 9 is a disc 13 which has a skirt 15 depending therefrom. The skirt 15 has a shoulder 17 cut into its outer periphery. A ring-shaped bearing assembly 19 is supported between the ring-shaped member 9 and the disc 13 by the complementary shoulders 11 and 17 of these two members. To hold the disc member 13 in position to properly support the bearing assembly 19, a second or intermediate disc 21 is secured to the top of the disc 13 the nozzle.

in fact-to-face relationship therewith. The disc 21 is of larger diameter than the aggregate diameters of the lower disc 13 and the ring-shaped bearing assembly 19 so that it extends beyond and rests upon the ring-shaped bearing assembly 19 which in turn is supported as mentionedabove by the shoulders 11 and 17 of the permanent ring-shaped member 9 and the disc 13. With this arrangement, the discs 13 and 21 are rotatable as a unit within the ring-shaped base 9.

Supportedin-spaced-apart relationship above the intermediate disc 21 is an upper disc 23 which is secured to the disc 21 through connector studs 25, 26.

As seen'furtherin Figures 1 and 2, each of the discs 13, 21 ahd 23 has an elongated slot cut out through their central portion. These slots 28 are in alignment with one another to accommodate the elongated guide nozzle 30 which extends through the slots 28 and is secured to the top disc 23. The nozzle 30 tapers inwardly as it extends downwardly toward the nozzle mouth so that the sheet material 32 passing through the nozzle may be satisfactorily guided in a desired direction as it leaves the opening 7 in the top plate 5 of the housing and terminates at a point within the housing interior.

The film or sheet material 32'is passed or drawn between a pair of cooperating slitter or cutting rolls 40, 42. As'seen better in Figure 3, the roll 42 has a plurality of cutting or slitting blades 44 extending around its periphery in a direction perpendicular to the axis of the roll. The rolls 40 and 42 are supported on shafts 46 and 48 and as seen in Figure 1 are driven through shaft 46 of roll 40 by the drive pulley 50. The rolls 40 and 42 therefore serve both to slit or cut the sheet material as well as to draw the sheet material from its supply means which operates to oscillate the base and-the nozzle supported thereon. This oscillating action, of course,

adjacent the nip of the slitting rolls whereby small minute folds will be set up in the material at the roll nip all across the material. With this arrangement, the slitting or cutting rolls will both slit the film material longitudinally and cut the material transversely to provide shredded strips of substantially uniform lengths.

Referring now to the drawing, there is provided a housing H consisting of the side walls 1, 1 and end walls 3, 3. A top plate 5 (Figure 2) is secured to the top surfaces of the side walls 1, 1 to extend across the top of the housing. An opening 7 is provided through the top plate 5.

source (not shown) and through the nozzle 30.

An air cylinder assembly generally designated as A on the drawing serves to urge the rolls 40 and 42 together into cutting relationship. With this arrangement, the rolls are progressively urged together as the blades wear down after prolonged cutting. The rolls may be separated for repair, etc., by merely shutting oi? the air supply to the cylinder assembly A.

As shown in Figure 2 of the drawing, the cut material is discharged from the housing H through a chute 55.

As explained above, our apparatus or shredder is designed to both slit or score cut the sheet material 32 as well as to cut the material transversely of its length to provide shredded strips of smaller and substantially uniform length. To satisfactorily carry out this dual operation, an oscillating drive means is provided to oscillate the guide nozzle 30 in a horizontal plane as the sheet material 32 is drawn through the nozzle. With this arrangement, the film material 32 will periodically have small folds introduced into the sheet material across the width of the material at a point immediately adjacent the nip of the cutting rolls 40 and 42. Since the sheet material is periodically folded over upon itself in this man ner, the slitting cutter blades 44 cut the material in both a longitudinal direction and in a somewhat transverse direction to provide small strips which are of substan- The mouth of the nozzle extends through tially uniform length. The twist imparted to the material imparts a desired curl to the final strips.

To oscillate the guide nozzle which, as explained before, is supported in a rotatable mounting, a thrust hearing 5.7 (see Figure 2.). is positioned over the spacing stud 26 which connects the top. disc 23 with the intermediate disc 21 Aiiixed to the thrust bearing 57 is a drive rod- 59 which has approximately a 45 bend adjacent the attached end of the rod. At one end of the housing H, there is provided a plate 60 which terminates in a triangular shaped portion which provides a bearing seat for a vertically disposed rotary drive shaft 62. Afli-xed to,

the upper end of the shaft 62 is a circular shaped tabletop support 64 which rotates with the drive shaft 62. 1

Pivotally mounted on the table top support 64 adjacent the periphery thereofis a sleeve 66 through which the drive rod 59 is slidingly positioned and which rotates with the table top. At the extreme endof the free end of the rod 59 there is afiixed a stop or limiting collar 68 which prevents the rod from passing entirely out of the sleeve 66. as the sleeve moves to the position as shown in full dotted lines of Figure 1 during rotation of the table top 6.4. A similar stopv collar 70 is aiiixed to the driverod 59 at a point between the sleeve 66 and the attached end of the rod. This collar 70 limits the forward movement of the rod 59. Since the slide sleeve -66 is pivotally mounted to the table top support 64, the forward end of the sleeve will always approximately face the guide nozzle 30 during rotation of the table top support 64.

The full dotted line representation of'the drive rod 59. in Figure 1 represents the position assumed by the rod after the table top support has traveled 180- in the direction of the arrow. During the initial phase of this rotation, the sleeve 66 is drawn along the length ofthe rod 59' until it abuts the stopcollar 68. During the remainder of the 180 rotation, the sleeve 66 is forcedagainst the stop collar 68 to exert a pulling force along the rod and the stud 26 to rotate the guide nozzle and its supporting structure approximately 150".

As the table top support 64 continues to rotate in the direction of the arrow, the guide nozzle- 30 and its-supporting structure will travel in a reverse path instead of continuing to rotate in the direction of its initial travel during the 180 turn of the table top-support 64. During 1 this second phase of rotation, the sleeve 66 will slide back along the rod'59' until it abuts the stop collar 70 at which point, as rotation. of the table top support 64;

continues, it will exert a pushing force against thecollar 70 and along the rod 59 to rotate the guide nozzle 30 and its supporting structure back along its previously traveled path until the guide nozzle assumes its original position as set before the first phase of rotation was initiated. The angle in the rodcauses the guide to,

return along its original path rather than to continue in itsoriginal direction of rotation. The range of travel or: oscillation of the guide nozzle will be approximately 150. As the table top support 64 continues to rotate, the oscillation path assumed by'the guide nozzle and described above will'be repeated. As mentioned above, this will cause the sheetmaterial to fold uponitself at numerous points across the width of the sheet material periodic twist incorporated in the film or sheet material during the slitting, the shredded strip tapers inwardly as it progresses toward each end of the strip. In addition to providing shredded strips of substantially uniform length, it is seen that a unique strip shape is also imparted to. the shredded strips.

While preferred embodiments have been shown and described, it is to be understood that changes and variations may be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the present invention as defined in the appended claims.

We claim:

1. Apparatus for slitting continuous sheet material longitudinally and cutting it transversely comprising a slitting roller having a plurality of circumferentially extending blades, a smooth faced rollercooperating with said slitting roller, means urging said slitting roller against saidsmooth faced roller was to form a nip therebetween, means for driving said rollers, a guide constructed and arranged to closely confine" the edges and faces of the sheet, and means for oscillating said guide about the longitudinal axis thereof to an extent suificient to fold the sheet upon itself and to unfold the sheet, said guide comprising means for guiding the sheet in folded and unfolded condition between said rollers whereby the sheet is cutfrom edge to edge by said blades and cooperating roller as it passes between said rollers.

2-.In a machine for severing a continuous wide sheet intoa plurality of discontinuous narrow strips, a cutting roller having a plurality of circumferentially extending axially spaced blades, a smooth faced roller mounted for cooperative engagement with said cutting roller, means allel to one another so as to form a sheet feedingand cuttin'g-nip therebetween, means for driving'said rollers,

aguide for directing a continuous sheet into the nip of said rollers, said guide comprising a tapered sheet con: fining member the exit end of which is located close to the nip of said rollers, said guide being so mounted that the exit end of the sheet confining member is normally in aplane which includes-the nip of said rollers, and means for oscillating said guide about the longitudinal axis of the tapered sheet confining member to an extent suificient to'fold the sheet upon itself and tounfold the sheet between said sheet confining member and said rollers whereby the edges of the sheet are presented to the blades of said cutting roller and the'sheet is cut from edge to edge asit passes between said rollers.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS 913,013 Jensen Feb. 23,1909 1,410,667 Ford Mar. 28, 1922 1,731,967 Antonsen Oct. 15, 1929 2,354,293 Schimmel July 25, 1944 2,564,982. Lane Aug. 21, 1951 2,609,049 Rayburn Sept. 2, 1952 main-.- 

